Change Your Image
voxnoctis09
Reviews
La marche de l'empereur (2005)
Amazing film-making... but OY!! That narrative...
The cinematography is breathtaking, and what these filmmakers endured for months to bring this story to us is equally impressive. However, the narration anthropomorphizes the penguins when it's convenient. One such line had me literally rolling my eyes, when, after a mother breaks her unhatched egg, the narrative opines, "The loss is unbearable" or "devastating" or some other such dramatic nonsense, while the penguin stands there cluelessly, with the same vacant expression; clearly NOT devastated. The tag line of the movie, about this being a love story, love conquering all, blah blah blah, is equally full of crap. Yes, the emperor penguin is monogamous, but only serially so; they seek out and find a different mate each year, a fact glossed over by both this movie and those who would seek to find some parallels between these flightless birds and human relationships.
The tendency to anthropomorphize, however, is dumped with equal convenience when dozens of large, adult penguins stand around stupidly while another bird methodically harasses, attacks, then finally kills one of the penguin chicks. The adult penguins, who are every bit as large as the predatory bird (and FAR more numerous) do absolutely nothing, standing there like great tuxedoed statues. The plucky, clown-like music that normally plays when the chicks are on screen (to let you know, hey, they're cute!) is nowhere to be heard while the babies are being picked off easily with no interference from their parents. These are the same loving parental birds who suffered "unbearable loss" when an egg got cracked? Come on.
These birds, like most animals, are driven by instinct, not love, to reproduce. Apart from this serious flaw, in my opinion, the story itself (as shown, and untainted by flowery prose) is magnificent. Why they felt they had to embellish it is quite beyond me. These birds go to extreme limits in an unbelievably harsh environment to reproduce. That story alone, and the brilliant, sweeping shots of Antarctica, make this film very good.
Sommersturm (2004)
A sensitive and enjoyable film
This film immediately vaulted itself into the very top of my favorite gay-themed movies list after only one viewing. It's simply terrific, offering humor and heartache in equal servings. The acting from all the characters is brilliant, and like other viewers, I particularly liked the subtle and sensitive performance of Marlon Kittel in the role of Leo, as well as Alicja Bachleda-Curus's performance as Anke. I wish that the U.S. had the depth or courage to produce films like this. It seems most of my favorite gay-themed movies are foreign films. Others have gone into all the plot points and developments, so I won't rehash them, but I will touch on one thing I loved, and a couple of other viewers noted it as well... There is a lengthy scene late in the movie (chapter 17 on the DVD to be exact) that, for nearly two dialog-free minutes, allows the camera to fade in and out of varying scenes, from the introspective despair of Achim, lying by his girlfriend and obviously hurting over the loss of his best friend Tobi, to a series of scenes of the lake and the land in a rainstorm. Each of these scenes has a single focal point, whether a ball floating on the lake or a ladder on the side of a dock... it's a stunning montage from a cinematography standpoint, and the whole scene is accompanied by an incredibly beautiful, haunting melody on a cello. It's perfect, and I could have easily watched this scene in rapt attention had it carried on for another couple of minutes.
Eating Out (2004)
Could have been so much better
It could have been an interesting premise. But it was executed so horribly, I was just in awe of what a mess this all turned into. For me, the only reason to watch this film is to see Ryan Carnes for the bulk of 90 minutes. He is completely engaging and could probably have turned in a better performance had he been given a decent script and an experienced director. He is impossibly gorgeous and, as a straight actor, does a really good job of believably portraying a gay guy, without resorting to overacting or being stereotypically gay.
Jim Verraros, in his role as Kyle, is really pretty cute in his own right, except he curls his lips and bobbles his head around in a sneering, dismissive way almost whenever he talks and it's really unflattering and conveys completely the wrong message relative to what he's actually saying. In spite of being cute and all, though, the character of Kyle is utterly self-loathing and just a miserable, bitchy queen. He was also campy to the point of distraction, but again, I blame that on the screenplay. Verraros is no amazing actor, but I believe he could pull off an indie role reasonably well if given better tools.
Apart from having a nice upper body, I did not see the appeal of Caleb (played by Scott Lunsford). He reminded me far too much of "Ted" from Queer As Folk.
As for the rather abrupt ending, I find it a bit of a stretch that the geeky self-hating boy would, after one horrible dinner in which he basically pouted the whole time, land the ferociously hot, model-esquire party boy Marc, who apparently instantly forgets all about his major crush on Caleb and acts as though he's been pining away for Kyle all this time. But it had to be a dream for Jim Verraros... an openly gay guy getting to totally make out with a gorgeous straight guy in a movie.
The DVD itself was abysmal. There are only 4 chapter marks, which is ridiculous for any movie, the subtitles are utterly horrible (they're wrong half the time, omit words, misspell words, etc.), and the commentary is among the worst I've ever been subjected to -- I couldn't sit through more than about five cumulative minutes of it. (I jumped around to see if it ever improved.) Basically, it was five people sitting in an echo chamber of a room with what was clearly one cheap microphone in the middle of the room, all talking about whatever pops into their heads. Half the time it wasn't about the movie at all.
The DVD I got from Netflix was obviously edited, as there was no actual nudity in it whatsoever. So clearly there are at least two versions of this DVD out there, which is really just pretty crappy.
The cinematography is decent for the most part, but another person on here said it looked like a lot of the scenes were filmed by a security camera and I agree. Wide-angle lenses have their time and place, but they're sorely misused and overused in this movie. It results in some very weird scenes that you feel like you're watching from afar... definitely doesn't help draw you into the movie, and the inane dialogue certainly doesn't compel you to be drawn into the characters, either.
All in all, it's not an absolutely horrible movie, but it's sure not very good, and I couldn't recommend it without some serious caveats. I'm not sure I understand the shirtless makeout scene between Kyle and Marc after the credits roll, either. It just doesn't make any sense in the storyline and seems to have been added on for prurient reasons (in which case, it could have been much steamier). Moreover, the picture just freezes at a random point, while the counter keeps running, then the disc ends (cuts off, rather) a minute or so later. It's very amateurish, and sadly, fits in nicely with virtually every other technical aspect of the DVD.
Phil of the Future (2004)
Excruciatingly Bad
Several years ago, The Disney Channel used to have some decent original series. Nothing spectacular, but pretty entertaining. The stuff they're churning out these days is just crap. "Phil of the Future" has got to be the worst of the lot thus far, and I can't imagine it appealing to anyone but 12-year-old girls gushing over Ricky Ullman being cute or whatever (by the way, he's six months shy of being 19 and playing a 14 year old... nice).
The show employs the same non-stop annoying sound effects used in "Lizzie McGuire" (another show which, I believe, has a 19-year-old guy playing a 14-year-old). This might be effective if used 2-3 times per show, but they can't get through 30 seconds without adding sound effects to everything from a head turn to an eye blink.
Honestly, I thought the premise of the series sounded kind of fun, but the actual show is just dreadful. And though I don't know the story behind it, what about this caveman dude who lives with the family? Boy, that's one desperate actor. I'm sure that will look terrific on his S.A.G. resume: "Played a grunting caveman on a lame Disney Channel series. Didn't have any real lines, but got to shove food in my face all the time." It's obvious that Disney is trying to create a vehicle to sell Ricky Ullman as their next "it" kid, but surely they could have come up with something better than this tripe.